gethin

Sorry. UK idiom. 'Old' in that context doesn't mean old. My bad.

I personally think that these are hard to beat. I own four of them. I came from running two 575w HMIs but these are brighter, quieter, and more affordable. There's no ballast or extra cabling, which for me is a plus. They also have a dedicated remote control available so you don't have to rely on an app. The only "drawback" is that they can't be powered by v-mounts, but I have other lights that can be.
I'm very intrigued by the design of the new Molus G300 because I think I could fit two or maybe even three into a single case. But there are several ways in which the Nanlites still beat them.

Sorry to take the thread off-topic, by the way.

If you're fighting the sun then yeah, serious horsepower definitely comes into the equation!

There's a lot more to the question than just which lights to use.  If you're indoors and feel like you're fighting the sun and if the windows will be mostly out of focus in the background, you can just put ND gel over them - it's fairly cheap and fast.  If they'll be in focus, IMO ND gels look a little bit like shit so that might not be your best option.
If you're outdoors and fighting the sun, especially for close-ups, a collapsible reflector or two (or three if you have one which can give some negative fill) is often a lot better than trying to compete with the sun with your light.  You can get a pretty big reflector for about $30 from almost any photo store in the world.
Otherwise, short of going with really big lights, if you're trying to blast a light through a window and have it compete with the sun, it's going to have to be a pretty big light.  In those cases, I'd probably try to find a way to shoot the scene differently.  😄
These days my main kit consists of 1xAputure 600X, 1xAputure P300C, 1xAmaran 300C, 2xAmaran 150C - as well as the B7C lunchbox, MC4 mini-lunchbox, and a few scattered MX's.  It's more than enough for almost anything that I shoot.  I'll probably continue adding some stuff here and there when Aputure have huge sales (their Black Friday sale is legit - I got a huge discount on the 600X plus a couple of bonus things).  If I need to go bigger than that, I'm more likely to rent it or to just hire a gaffer to roll up with a box truck full of stuff.
For shooting on the go, I just also put together a kit with 3xStellaPro's with their Bowen mount - they're tiny and run off of USB-C so I can plug 'em into a V mount plate or even a battery bank.  Only disadvantage?  Above 30% or so, the fan runs constantly.  I'm excited to actually do a shoot with 'em.  I also picked up a Molus X100 for the cases where I want somebody to hand hold a light.  It's alright, but the reflector in the Bowens mount seems to do some funky things with my softboxes.
 

Well kinda disagree on this one. For me its about the look I can create with the lights, and during daytime I am allways fighting the sun. And 300w led lights for example dont allow much creative looks. Were playing with iso's you are just lowering or increasing exposure as is and not affecting the look in a dramatic way. Like popping the subject from the background. 
Not sure if you ever do flash photography, but I absolutely love the fact I can completely change the look of an image in bright sun with an flash. But yeah I dont like to deal with huge ass lights either an an one man band.

The 300w leds are great to have, of which I've used only the Aperture fixtures though. The 600D has a big footprint. Rather use a 2.5K HMI instead. But of course the Aperture is much lighter to rig and much less power draw and easily powered by regular circuits. Anyhow, 300w spot leds would be it on the top spots of the list. I also like the 100w amarans. Lightmats and tubes are super neat and easy to use. The amarans come in stronger versions now too. Havent tested them but seem to be great bang for the buck regarding light quality and usuability.

My big light is the Smallrig 450D. I love it. It's well-built and super bright when I need it. That said, most of the time the brightest lights I need are 300w. 

With reflectors on it's definitely around 2-3 stops brighter than my Godox SL200.

Take a look at Amaran and Smallrig

I'll do a yt search. In theory 600w led would be at a stop or two  higher than I have now, which might be ok.  

I've seen quite a few 1200 and 2400 fixtures in use on various DP YT channels, but really only when the spaces that need to be lit are on the bigger side. And they're pretty big old units, needing heavier duty stands etc and in a lot of cases no longer having Bowens mounts. You're really getting into van territory so I'd expect these bigger LEDs to be much more of a hire item than something you'd carry around in your daily kit as an owner-op.

I recently bought one of these (the daylight version) and am soon to get the bi-colour. I don't have the tools to test the metrics, but they're extremely bright and reasonably quiet. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/385671087101?itmmeta=01HWMW3M2R3J7XYR6MXF4WNV52&hash=item59cbc9c3fd:g:GeQAAOSw4f5kgv5S&itmprp=enc%3AAQAJAAAAwFc8zK2w7uAzhpc1h248S6jNA5Gw%2FYnu0N1Oh9zktYieBDQ0XN3Y2S1YLVVfrVCJwMOe%2FWIN8QX%2F1Y6qh%2BuG964LZb8IkftuUcmkq%2Bxo6n1YRp%2BuqoPgcv84%2BMzIWIWVd3SNpq4mnPPPWRlsiCOiPNsl84vGLEZ4S51kzT17vRYoFI5EpvbRtTDEWvTvpSYVdxv4DenaLzgf0W37yPC5B%2FiZ3bP6%2BKW2Dm6iDH7x2H7AFj9ubifexmkIp5%2B%2FQ8Cxxg%3D%3D|tkp%3ABk9SR7rBjpzlYw

This is a UK link, but I think they're available in most markets.

Open Gate for sure.
I have been using 6k 30p up until the last few weeks for this very reason, the ability to produce 2 productions from the same result. Just one being sub 1.5 minutes and 9:16.
Having the full sensor height and using a 9:16 overlay when shooting was perfect…except being in a PAL region and being a fairly heavy slo mo shooter, shooting 30p has been a big compromise.
Too big a compromise so I have gone back to shooting cropped 4k 50p which fixes my slo mo issue, but reduces my ability to produce that second social media production a bit…
I’m looking forward to shooting that next gen of camera next year whoever it is with, but the Z8 has to be the strongest contender for me right now based on what exists.

well after a day of cutting z8 and mavic 3 footage, I'm wondering what the hell I'm doing. I stumbled on some phantom 4 pro stuff I shot a few year ago and honestly its less noisy, has better highlight rolloff, but most of all it was quicker: That's the thing I'm increasingly thinking. Maybe I can improve on what I was doing 3 years ago, but only a bit, if at all, and at what time cost? If I have to denoise every shot, and mask windows to try to squeak some highlights in from outside, for a marginal improvement in a sector where I'm competing with people charging $200 and shooting on an iphone. I've seen some of the HDR iphone footage and its pretty amazing.   

I just shot my first couple of things in nlog.  Can anyone point me to alternative luts I can check out?  The nikon lut is contrasty, and the skies are a bit fluro-turquoise.  I've just had a go at grading it myself without the lut and I need something in-between mine and the nikon one.   I'm in premiere for now.  I've tried turning down the intensity and tweaking the HUE/HUE controls in premiere but its a bit limited. 

Have you tried the Flat profile?
I’ve read and seen some good stuff coming from that.
Last day of a semi-working break and been doing some musing as you (I) do and the pairing of Z8 & Z9 are back on top (had a short dalliance with an imaginary gal called R3 and for her body alone, she would still be my pick, but lenses, less attractive), especially now that the Tamron 35-150 has been officially announced.
I wish I could try one but as none seem to be available in La belle France…

Far be it from me to encourage you to have more immediate gear angst but Megadap have just released the v3 Pro version of their E to Z adapter which promises even better compatibility with the Tamron lenses and improvements in AF generally, plus the ability to update its firmware directly from the camera.
So even if they don't immediately produce the 20-40mm f2.8 you could pick up an E mount version and attach the Megadap to it in the meantime to go with the native Z mount 35-150.
Opens up the a lot of other lens possibilities too from the E mount world, particularly the Sigma contemporary range.
My experience of the Megadap on @Andrew Reid's Z9 was that it was already near native performance so any advance on that will make it well worth checking out.
https://megadap.net/product/megadap-sony-e-to-nikon-z-autofocus-adapter-etz21pro/
 
 

H265 looks worse than ProRes HQ or N-RAW but only in terms of texture, the dynamic range should be the same.
I haven't done any side by side tests but it looks like the DR in N-log is the same as on Z9 or Z6II.

Are you shooting in N-log? What are you using to transform the footage to REC709?
The official LUTs are pretty harsh, even the updated ones for Z8. That might be your problem. 

Prores HQ looks way better, especially in nlog on the Z8 and the Z9. When you shoot in h265 there's a disgusting amount of internal noise reduction going on no matter what profile you're in and it's not possible to switch it off.

Interesting.  I'm curious, how are you converting to rec709?  Are you using Nikon's 3d LUT?  I shoot in NLOG frequently on my Nikon Z6, and i find that Nikon's 3D LUT has pretty bad highlight rolloff.  I get significantly better results if I use Davinci Resolve's Color Space Transform to go from Rec2020/NLOG to Rec709/Rec709.  Seriously, looks wayyy better than the LUT.  You should be able to get great results from NLOG; give Davinci's CST a try.

I bit the bullet and bought a z8.  I've done a bit of testing and couple of shoots.  First impressions are not great.
I need to do some more scientific testing this weekend, but the highlight rolloff and lack of dynamic range make the 10 bit h.265 look worse than my 8bit z6ii.  I was keen to get the raw video for those times where I wanted the best possible quality, but kinda hoping and expecting (from the general comments/videos/raving I've seen) that the h.265 would be a step up from the z6.  The stills dynamic range isn't quite up to my 11 year old d800 either.  And today I found the autofocus hunting a bit in low light.  Seeing as my bread and butter shooting involves low light and very high contrast I'm not sure it's the right fit for me so far. I've tried ramping up the d-lighting but meh.  

Anyone know if the highlight rolloff improves with pro res?  I really don't want to shoot raw for my little shoots - $7K AUD to make my life harder 🤦 

I really love high dynamic range stills cameras, I don't think there's one hybrid camera in sony's line up that is a good fit either. It's kinda depressing knowing that I could increase the quality of my output by shooting stills consistently with that 11 year old beastie. 

The sensor in the z9 is designed for speed. I've found Nikon flagship D4/5 cameras lacking in dynamic range.  It was the first thing I googled when it came out: what the video dynamic range was like, and from everything I could find it wasn't great. And yep the odd video sample with gnarly highlight rolloff. Say that itqs dynamic range is limited in a Nikon group and people go slightly nuts 😆.  I'm a Nikon shooter, im used to waiting: so I'm waiting for the z6iii or z8, and Nikon hopefully getting back to the 14 stops of the d8xx's

The sensor in the z9 is designed for speed. I've found Nikon flagship D4/5 cameras lacking in dynamic range.  It was the first thing I googled when it came out: what the video dynamic range was like, and from everything I could find it wasn't great. And yep the odd video sample with gnarly highlight rolloff. Say that itqs dynamic range is limited in a Nikon group and people go slightly nuts 😆.  I'm a Nikon shooter, im used to waiting: so I'm waiting for the z6iii or z8, and Nikon hopefully getting back to the 14 stops of the d8xx's

The sensor in the z9 is designed for speed. I've found Nikon flagship D4/5 cameras lacking in dynamic range.  It was the first thing I googled when it came out: what the video dynamic range was like, and from everything I could find it wasn't great. And yep the odd video sample with gnarly highlight rolloff. Say that itqs dynamic range is limited in a Nikon group and people go slightly nuts 😆.  I'm a Nikon shooter, im used to waiting: so I'm waiting for the z6iii or z8, and Nikon hopefully getting back to the 14 stops of the d8xx's